Google Inc. announced Friday that it will apply to bid for wireless spectrum in a January Federal Communications Commission auction. The Mountain View, Calif., Internet company had previously said it would probably bid for spectrum, a chunk of the airwaves that can be used to provide mobile phone and Internet services.

Leading news organizations and other publishers have proposed changing the rules that tell search engines what they can and can’t collect when scouring the Web, saying the revisions would give site owners greater control over their content.

Facebook has closed another big tranche of its planned funding round, this time from an unlikely source: Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, who has made an investment of $60 million, reports Kara on AllThingsD.

Time spent watching television will rise faster than leisure time spent on the Web through 2012, while a major audience for Internet video could take even longer to develop, consultancy Bain & Co said on Thursday.

The desire for greater control over how search engines index and display Web sites is driving an effort by leading news organizations and other publishers to revise a 13-year-old technology for restricting access.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has released a report containing analysis of Comcast’s Internet traffic interference activities. The EFF’s study provides strong evidence that Comcast is using packet-forging to disrupt peer-to-peer filesharing.

Tongues were wagging earlier this week on speculation that the News Corporation would buy LinkedIn, the professionals-oriented social network, early next year. (Never mind that the rumors were thinly sourced.)

While online video has had a place on most of the 150 websites behind Gannett’s (NYSE: GCI) over the past few years, the company has found it difficult to seamlessly organize, distribute and, most important, make money from it.